July 10, 2026

Photo credit: Paul Morigi / Stringer / Getty Images Entertainment via Getty Images

Earlier this week, Ana María Archila, commissioner of New York City’s Office for International Affairs, was scheduled to meet with Iran’s ambassador and permanent representative to the United Nations, Amir-Saeid Iravani. Archila allegedly did not inform Mayor Zohran Mamdani of the meeting and was directed to cancel it. The State Department met with the Mamdani administration to clarify acceptable conduct.

“The development is a continuation of Commissioner Archila and the Mamdani administration’s ongoing use of public resources to advance an agenda that extends well beyond New York City,” Adam Lehodey writes. Back in April, for instance, a memo was sent to staff within the Mayor’s Office for International Affairs asking them to prioritize engaging with foreign officials who “are . . . in political alignment/leftist.”

The purpose of the Mayor’s Office for International Affairs is to share best practices with other cities, support city government’s relationship with the diplomatic community in New York, and bring in foreign business—all without regard for political party or ideology.

“It’s more than a stretch to suggest that a meeting with representatives of a country with whom the United States is engaged in hostilities, and with whom it has no diplomatic relations, would help achieve those ends,” Lehodey argues.

Read more.

Last week, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and City Council Speaker Julie Menin reached a deal for the city’s fiscal year 2027 budget. It boosts Department of Education funding by $894 million, bringing education spending to a grand total of $38.6 billion, amounting to a whopping 31 percent of the budget.

Never mind that K-12 enrollment is declining, or that 503 schools had a majority of students who failed state tests in math and reading last year, or that 62 percent of high school students attend a failing school.

“City officials refuse to admit it, but the uncomfortable reality is that New York City has the most inefficient public schools in the nation,” Danyela Souza Egorov writes. “No large urban district spends so much and gets so little in results for its children. As long as this reality goes unacknowledged, more money won’t make much difference.”

Read more.

Activists who push for more lenient immigration policies often argue that immigrants commit less crime than the native population. Parsing the accuracy of that claim is not easy, given the dearth of reliable data.

“If we hope to move this debate toward resolution and reach a durable political compromise, Americans need more reliable, granular data on which to base their decisions,” William J. Bratton and Rafael A. Mangual write. “A good place to start would be for police departments to collect information on the immigration status of those they arrest. Yet many departments, including the NYPD, are barred from even asking arrestees about their immigration status.”

Read more.

Jake Altman was a member of the Democratic Socialists of America for over ten years. Not long ago, the organization still embraced political tolerance and open debate, and members viewed it as a bridge to mainstream labor-liberalism.

But as younger members started joining in the mid-2010s, the DSA grew more extreme. “First there were the purity tests of Black Lives Matter and BDS, then apologia for Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and support for Hamas and its atrocities,” Altman writes. In response, many older members left, and the organization has become increasingly focused on extremist goals.

“What happened to the DSA can and will happen to the Democratic Party if more moderate Democrats don’t organize against it,” Altman warns.